1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an automatic analyzer for performing qualitative/quantitative analysis of a biological sample such as blood and urine and more particularly to an automatic analyzer including a reagent cassette holding mechanism for holding a plurality of reagent cassettes.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, for the purpose of making measurements on a plurality of analysis items, an automatic analyzer for performing qualitative/quantitative analysis of a biological sample such as blood and urine includes a reagent cassette storage unit for storing therein a plurality of reagents corresponding to the analysis items. An administrator of the automatic analyzer manages the reagent cassette storage unit so that reagents required for analysis for a day are stored. However, in the event that a reagent shortage occurs during the analysis, the analysis is temporarily interrupted to replace the reagents.
On the other hand, the number of analysis items to be analyzed by the automatic analyzer increases. Therefore, for the purpose of analyzing the other items, each reagent cassette is also miniaturized so that a large number of reagent cassettes can be placed. In this case, in comparison with the conventional analyzers, there is a higher possibility that a reagent shortage will occur during analysis. In response to the above problem, there is disclosed in JP-A-2005-37171 an automatic analyzer including a mechanism that is capable of automatically adding a reagent to a reagent cassette storage unit.